The Lady of The Airport
by E Salvatore
Summary: There is a lady. She has red hair and green eyes and is paler than pale. She dresses impeccably and sits at the airport, for hours at a time. Some say she is alright;some say she is in pain and some... Chair O/S. Full summary inside. Rated cautiously.


**THE LADY OF THE AIRPORT**

**There is a lady. She has red hair and green eyes and is paler than an albino vampire. She dresses impeccably and sits at the airport, for hours at a time. Some say she is alright; some say she is in pain. Some say one day… one day she'll take flight. And they were all wrong… until the day they were right. Chair, O/S.**

* * *

><p>Red hair.<p>

Green eyes.

Deathly pale.

Gone are the brunette locks, the doe-eyes and the rosy complexion. The hair and the eyes are artificial, of course; the best that money can buy, naturally. But the sick pallor of her skin is entirely natural; the creams-and-roses that she wears for everyone else is an end result to hours of slaving over her make-up and sometimes excessive pinching of her cheeks – an extreme measure, even for her.

Gone are the days when she would eat all that her heart desired and later force it back up; these days she can hardly force anything _down_. She knows it is bad when her mother – her _mother _who has spent her whole life silently pleading her only child to shed those last few pounds – steps in and reprimands the prince for being so inattentive. Louis is lost, naturally; he knows the cause but not the cure. His family knows nothing. She knows everything. But even she admits (only to herself, of course) that Dior does _not _flatter her new curve-less form.

Gone are the days when she was the center of attraction and longed for _more _attention; these days all she wants is peace and quiet, and a minute or two or a hundred to let silent tears fall.

And also, the occasional day to lose herself in the crowds and yet stand out.

Gone are the days when everyone knew her name; these days, she is simply The Lady of The Airport.

* * *

><p>It is a nice day.<p>

It is a nice day because the skies are clear. It is a nice day because she is here. It is a nice day because she has seen fourteen couples reunite, and it is only 2 in the afternoon.

She sits at the bar, facing the crowds. She knows she stands out, but not because of her striking emerald dress that makes her artificial eyes pop. She is The Lady of The Airport, and that is explanation enough. She never meant to make a spectacle out of herself, but after days of watching, curiosity was piqued and questions were asked and she simply became The Lady. In some way, she enjoys this more than being Queen Bee or princess. It has this tragically whimsical feel to it and there is nothing she loves more than tragedy… until it breaks her as it has.

As usual, she sneaks out of the Palace, loses the tail Louis has on her at all times and makes her way here. Her transformation is brief: it is so very easy for her to drop the façade and let the pain enter her eyes. She walks in and all eyes are on her. She sits on a barstool and all living souls give her space. She stares at the Arrivals and watches as loved ones are reunited, keeping count. It is a good day when many are brought together.

Then, inevitably, a dark knight greets his brunette princess with such passion as opposed to the cliché hug-and-twirl.

It is too alike.

It is too much.

It is too painful, even for her.

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><p>It is the day before her anniversary and she has nothing for the prince.<p>

Oh, she knows what he – and the rest of the nation – want most. _An heir_. But she does not have it in her to give anymore. She is empty; hollow; a shell of her former self. She has given all she has. She has tried her best. But this, this is sacred. This is _theirs_. And she is allowed to dream, is she not?

When _he _talked about great loves and right loves, had he stopped to think that maybe right love would never be enough once you had tasted great love? That you never really recovered from an eclipse?

He hadn't, and she hates him for it. Or, at the very least, she wants to hate him for it. But she loves him too much – yes, she _loves_ him, so much. Letting go and moving on prove to be harder than anything when she can't even stop; can't even stop loving him. It has been well over a year now and still her heart longs for nothing more than the safe comfort of their painful love.

Yes, she thinks to herself as the painful reunion scene once again plays out... she would have rather liked to be painfully in love with him for the rest of her life.

* * *

><p>She does not know this life.<p>

But _oh_, what a life it is. A ball here, a dance there; a celebration today, an honoring tomorrow. It is a flurry of gorgeous dresses, gorgeous shoes and even more spectacular jewels interspersed with the finest of blue bloods and impeccable breeding.

Yet there is no _life_ in this life and that makes all the difference. Her younger self – even her high-school self – would have traded anything at any moment for this life, and how she longs to be that girl again. But try as she might, great love and great pain seem to prove indelible and so she is stuck with overrated gems and loud laughter and interbred fools.

Pain turns everything ugly.

Her only escape is that life; the other life she keeps secret. But it is dangerously close to being shattered – just the other day one of Louis's many cousins had passed by her in the airport and had stopped to come up to her; the first one brave enough to approach her after eighteen months of solitary musings. She'd told her that she looked familiar and she had brushed it off with a fake accent.

But still – dangerously close.

And the most dangerous part is that she thrives on this adrenaline.

Because this is a cry for help, whether she wants to admit it or whether anyone else knows. It is a cry for help and right now, help is all she needs to save herself.

She hopes she'll get it before she's too far gone, but the Grimaldi name has not taken away her pessimism and so she knows that she will lose herself, sooner rather than later.

* * *

><p>It hurts.<p>

So much.

Serena has been here and Nate has been here and even Dan Humphrey, scum of Brooklyn, has been welcomed. And yet _he_ is nowhere to be found.

She is hurt and this pain gives way to anger, because he had not mentioned anything about giving up their friendship. So they love each other, to the point of recklessness. So they cannot be together in that sense. But like it or not, he is everything to her and why can't he see that?

She sits, again, just nursing a drink that she will never put to her lips. The scent of his poison of choice is enough for her, but to actually taste the substance would be entirely too much, and she does not need to cry in front of everyone in this busy place of going, going, going.

But why is she staying, when the rest of the world is going?

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><p>She hates this person she has become.<p>

Blair Grimaldi disgusts her. Princess Blair Grimaldi is even worse. All she ever does is stand there in pretty dresses and laugh at the right time and smile at the right people. Then she talks to a few children and smiles as the elderly comment on how maternal she is and how she must be carrying – just look at that glow.

Blair Waldorf would never have settled for this, because Waldorfs don't settle, period. They get what they want.

And she knows instinctively that Blair Bass wouldn't have settled, either.

But then again, Blair Bass wouldn't have had to settle.

She would have been living the dream.

* * *

><p>Louis isn't exactly the same person, either.<p>

She had refused to believe, in the early stages of their marriage, that he would be just like any other prominent man who courted and married a trophy wife and then left her to rot.

And no, her own prince doesn't leave her to rot, but he leaves her to herself, and that is much more fatal than anything else. Every day she is surrounded by jewels and strangers and more cold gems and not even Serena can save her when the blonde makes her occasional trips.

Sometimes she goes back to the city – always as Princess Blair, and not The Lady, of course – but he is always gone. It is as if he has someone trained specifically to keep an eye on her and avoid run-ins, and knowing him, she does not doubt this to be true.

But why must he hurt her so?

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><p>She is left alone for the next month and no one checks on her. She may be the future ruler but really, who cares?<p>

A shiny bauble can only fascinate for so long before it fades, and that is exactly what has become of her. Occasionally, she is brushed and polished to hang on the arms of her prince and be fussed over, but then she is returned to her case to gather dust. On her own, the circuitous routes she makes at each event is that much harder to maneuver but even with Louis she can only keep the smile in place for so long.

Silently, she slips out of the Palace again and is gratified yet hurt to find that she no longer has a tail. Even Louis doesn't care anymore, it seems. But maybe that is better, though the adrenaline dims significantly. Where is the rush of being chased when there is no one to chase you? When no one cares anymore?

It doesn't matter, she tells herself. This is better, even if it hurts. Louis's affection has kept her here for two years, but if even he doesn't care anymore, then she must find something else to tether herself to. Because her freedom is too tempting, and there is a flight to the city which leaves in two hours.

She makes a mental note to herself to start carrying her passport and documents with her next time, all the while warring with herself because this makes an escape so much easier.

Never mind that it doesn't matter whether or not she carries the papers with her. When Blair Waldorf makes up her mind, it is as good as done.

It feels so good to be herself again.

* * *

><p>It happens when Louis asks, once again, for a child.<p>

She says no.

He says please.

She retreats.

He yells.

And then she runs, because he has _never _treated her in such a way and despite the fact that her other relationship, her great love, had been a tumultuous mess of hurtful words and wounds, this is not the way her fairytale goes. And this can't possibly be what _he _wanted for her when he stripped away her right to choose.

Louis does not follow her, but she doesn't do the dramatic thing of taking flight immediately, either. The past two years have grounded her, in a way, and so she finds herself, once again, a green-eyed redhead who sits and contemplates.

She can leave, at any moment. Right now. But would she be welcomed? Would _he _welcome her?

Her entire being bristles at the possibility of rejection. Of course he would welcome her. He will always love her, and that is enough.

It is a testament to how true this rings when she doesn't even doubt him; doesn't even doubt herself.

Yet she goes back to Louis because she owes it to _him _to at least try. He hasn't put himself in pain for the last two years for nothing, and she doesn't want it to be for nothing.

So she tries.

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><p>And then, one day, she quietly leaves.<p>

It is not a ground-breaking, earth-shattering moment of _I cannot live without you_, because she has known that all along, Rather, it is a choice – _I don't want to live without you_ – and therein lies the significance of it, because it is her choice. It is what she wants.

So she leaves, and in that one moment she is alright – no longer tortured because she is almost home, to him – and she is in pain – because Louis meant something to her, even if it wasn't a lot – and she takes flight.

And she is free even as she flies to him.

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><p><strong>Hey guys!<strong>

**So… first Chair fic. First Gossip Girl fic, period. I've always wanted to write Chair, and past cross-overs under other pennames had allowed me to incorporate some elements of their relationship, but today this came to me and I had to do it, never mind that I haven't written anything in more than a month.**

**I fell in love with the idea of Blair people-watching at the airport, but in her own unique way. Because we all know Blair can't do anything like normal people. There's really this sense of - melancholia? – you can get when you're down and watching people in the airport, or at least that's how it works for me. You just watch these people, going, going ,going; coming, coming, coming and you get lost. I hope that came across in this fic.**

**Fingers crossed I get to some of my Chair ideas soon, because it turns out I love writing Blair – maybe even more than any other fanfiction character!**

**If you enjoyed this, feel free to leave a review. Or, you know, PM me. Maybe check out my website? I have Twitter!**

_**E Salvatore,**_

_**September 2011.**_


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